


Logical

by tridecaphilia



Category: Darker Than Black, Inception (2010)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Fusion, F/M, Gen, M/M, Unrequited Love, no actual relationships just a lot of longing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-14
Updated: 2013-06-14
Packaged: 2017-12-15 00:17:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 811
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/843118
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tridecaphilia/pseuds/tridecaphilia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's been six months since the sky vanished and Arthur changed, and now he's finally gone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Logical

**Author's Note:**

> Another of the challenge Inception crossovers I wrote. I missed yesterday's update, so you get two today.

Ariadne thinks that besides her, Eames is probably the one most affected by Arthur’s change.

Arthur still loathes Eames, but it’s for a different reason now: he finds his remuneration irritating at best and intolerable at worst, and despises how often he ends up using Eames to perform it. And Eames makes no secret of his delight at Arthur’s remuneration, and offers if Arthur ever hesitates, particularly if Ariadne has already woken up. To Arthur’s new self, Eames is not only ridiculous and annoying, he is an idiot and a fool, wasting his affections on a target who cannot, will not, and would not return them if he could.

And Ariadne can see that Eames’s affections are genuine. His gentle teasing, the occasional pet name, and his frequently misguided and/or dysfunctional attempts at mentoring Arthur are the only ways he knows to show it—besides, of course, the flirting he offers everyone—but his affection for Arthur is different. Ariadne wouldn’t call it love, exactly—probably, though that might just be jealousy talking—but she’s seen enough, both from Eames and his projections, to know it’s true. Eames’s heart was broken when the new star appeared in the fake sky, just like hers.

At times she thinks, or rather hopes, that Arthur cares for her, but this Arthur, colder and just as logical as the old one with none of the teasing or caring or understanding underneath, just recognizes that she is female and his age and thus logically, were he to choose one, a more productive and suitable mate. It has nothing to do with whether he would want to be with her, only that he could get her pregnant.

Which only makes it hurt worse that she’s the first one he turns to, in the dream or out, to perform his completely unfair remuneration for his literally earth-shaking ability. More than once, he’s used it as a kick, and she’s woken to his lips on hers and Eames resolutely looking away, as though it makes it somehow better or easier for her because Arthur prefers to use her and she can’t bring herself to stop him.

There have been people, a lot of them over time, who have said Arthur shouldn’t work with them anymore, or even that he isn’t a person anymore and should be “put down” or studied. Some of them, Ariadne thought Arthur would have gone with if Cobb hadn’t held him back.

Cobb. The one person in their group who Arthur still responds to like before. Maybe because Cobb refuses to be Arthur’s payment, no matter what the circumstances, out of misplaced loyalty to Mal. Maybe some shred of the old Arthur just can’t bear to give up his old life, his old job. The words he’d said to Ariadne still ring in her ears, understanding and understated. “ _There’s nothing quite like it._ ” She has to believe that that was why he stayed, and Cobb’s insistence is just an excuse.

Her illusion is shattered when the team is talking after a job, about six months after the fake sky appeared and Arthur woke up someone _different_ from before. She forgets who brought it up, but the team is reluctantly discussing natural dreams. She learns that Eames sometimes takes independent jobs that amount to sharing people’s dreams,* and Cobb admits he can no longer dream without the machines. Yusuf claims to still have dreams of his own—the benefits of being a chemist—but also indulges in his dream den on occasion. She knows Cobb was still protective of her for Miles’s sake and she doesn’t want him to panic, so she is holding off revealing that the last time she dreamed on her own—a week ago—it was a nightmare.

It is while looking for a way to avoid answering that Ariadne sees Arthur leave and followed him, wondering if he is about to follow Cobb’s example and use the machines to dream. It could have been all the proof she needed that Contractor or not, Arthur was still Arthur.

Instead, she gets there just in time to see Arthur leaving the room, leaving the machines apparently untouched but something red sitting next to them glinting in the light.

Already knowing what she will find, Ariadne crosses to the table and picks up Arthur’s totem. She rolls it, wondering what number meant to Arthur that he was in reality.

The die lands on five.

Not sure why this affects her so much more than anything else, Ariadne starts to cry. She picks up the die and pockets it. She knows why Arthur discarded the die. What use did such a logical mind have for a tool that only pointed out the flaws in a dream’s logic? What could it possibly tell him?

What does it tell _her,_ except that Arthur isn’t Arthur anymore?

**Author's Note:**

> Eames sharing other people's dreams is a tidbit of fanon borrowed from a fic I read. I forget the title but do remember it was Arthur/Eames and it was a side note there. Unfortunately, given that I wrote this years ago, I don't think I could find that fic again if I tried.


End file.
